XYLENE POWER LTD.

NUCLEAR ENERGY

TABLE OF CONTENTS

By Charles Rhodes, P.Eng., Ph.D.

There are two methods of producing nuclear energy, fission and fusion. Both methods are explored on this web site.

From an electricity utility perspective nuclear energy obtained via fast neutron fission of heavy elements is the only source of non-fossil energy that can sustainably and economically provide the uninterruptible electric power required to displace fossil fuels.

The sun is powered by fusion so renewable energy is actually fusion energy. However, due to the rotation of planet Earth about its axis at any particular point on Earth's surface solar energy is intermittent. Solar and wind electricity generators require efficient daily and seasonal energy storage and related long distance transmission to provide uninterruptible electricity. The cost of making intermittent solar and wind sourced electricity uninterruptible is usually prohibitive. It is generally more practical to price electricity at uninterruptible and interruptible rates so that applications that require uninterruptible electricity pay much more per blended kWh than applications that can operate using only interruptible electricity.

Other than via renewable energy, fusion based electricity generation is difficult and expensive to realize on Earth. For fundamental physical and thermodynamic reasons, as long as fission fuel is available, the cost of a kWhe from Earth based fusion will always be several times the cost of a kWhe from Earth based fission.